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Sunday, April 29, 2012

Commercial Real Estate Market

Media Hype signals the kiss of death...

Media Reports are one of the most reliable key sentiment indicators that we use to identify the end of a market cycle, and a change in herd behavior. Once you read it on the front page of your news paper, it's already old news on wall street.

We first noticed the media's hype concerning the commercial real estate back in March, and this seemed to climax during the last week in April.

NYC office rents seen rising 16% through 2013

"Manhattan commercial asking rents will advance 16% over the next three
years, the second biggest gain in the nation, according to a forecast
released by Cushman & Wakefield Inc. on Thursday.

Only San Francisco, where rents are expected to jump 33% through 2013, will best New York, the report said.

New
York is benefitting from a much stronger job market than many cities in
the country, said Maria Sicola, head of research for the Americas at
Cushman. She said that in New York, 40% of the jobs lost during the
recession have come back.

I have always enjoyed good fiction, but I think it takes the imagination of a 3 year old to rationalize that a 40% come back in the jobs market equates to a 33% projected yearly gains in an already bloated Commercial Real Estate market!

Irrational exuberance surrounding the REIT sector seems equally absurd, considering Fed easy money policy combined with Pressure on banks to continue reckless lending practices in the face of
the a liquidity drought brought on by the collapse in the residential real
estate market has only continued to fuel the commercial real-estate bubble globally.

Chines ghost cities:

History teaches us: A collapse in residential real estate is always followed by one in commercial real estate. Cycles every 25 years or so; so don't think that because the next shoe didn't fall in '08... that there isn't a size 12 coming in 2012.

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About Me

I use a hybrid blend of technical indicators; cyclicality, sentiment, chart patterns, and more, to analyze the current market environment and provide short and long term outlook. It was never my intention to become a market timer, let alone try to make a living at it! It just came naturally. In 2010 I became a Hall of Fame Author at stochcharts.com after calling the flash crash, the subsequent rebound, and the eventual bottoming of the market in July of that same year. I drew quite a following, and needed more room to write, so I started this blog. Someone suggested I add a PayPal button, and the rest is history. This has all been a great learning experience, and I am very grateful for the opportunity. Please follow me on Twitter for the latest charts and my continuing up to the minute market outlook.